The committee of three on the Mike Brown Award are not to be envied. The current SoHG president and two previous award recipients are charged with selecting an award recipient from what is usually a list of half a dozen most worthy nominees, each of whom reflects, in his or her own way, the late namesake’s embodiment of friendship, dedication to hickory golf, and respect for the traditions and values of the game.
In the end, the committee announced with great pride that its selection for 2021 is Mr. Tom Johnson of Tallmadge, Ohio. Johnson is known to a great many people in the hickory world as the host, with his wife, Karen, of the Foxburg Hickory Championship, a tournament with a primarily pre-1900 flavor.
When asked for an interview on the occasion of the award, Mr. Johnson replied, “Let me think about it for a few days and get back to you.” Get back to us he did with a surprisingly effusive – for the customarily soft-spoken man of few words – essay which teaches us something about humility, joy in friendship, and a love for hickory golf and the lessons it offers. It also expresses his depth of affection and appreciation for his wife, Karen, who, as the love of his life, has supported him in all his many endeavors as he has supported hers.
The text below is adapted from Johnson’s essay. Click here to see the complete version.
Our congratulations and our heartfelt thanks to Tom Johnson, the Society of Hickory Golfers’ 2021 Mike Brown Award recipient.
Tom Johnson and his wife, Karen, met at a wedding reception for mutual friends in 1981. She was raised in Tallmadge, Ohio, the small town where the couple currently resides, and next to Mogadore, the even smaller town of 3,500 where Johnson was raised. They were married in
“Among her many remarkable skills, she is the only woman I know who has driven a locomotive,” he says. “Yes, one of those big, diesel, 2,000-gallon tank machines. Not sure how the National Transportation Safety Board would feel about that.”
Johnson has enjoyed a 47-year career in grocery distribution operations, sincerely appreciating the opportunities it has provided to exercise leadership responsibilities and to promote a positive culture. He currently works for Vistar, a division of Performance Food Group.”I am enjoying this professional time of my life,” he says. “Retirement is around the corner, but I want to nurture this opportunity to make a difference first.”
He has a modest, but distinguished, golf collection of very old clubs and early balls which remind him constantly of the massive evolution in the game wrought by the ball’s changes from featherie to gutty and then rubber core.
Click here to see the Spring 2020 story in The Golf, about Johnson’s collection.
“My first foray into hickory golf in the early 1990s was trying certain clubs I had found at flea markets and auctions while playing regular golf,” he says. “Eventually tried a couple of the Golf Collector Society “Hickory Hackers” during collector shows, but these were nothing compared with the evolution that hickory golf would take over the next 20 years.
“When it comes to playing, the greatest golf experience I have had is hickory golf. I have been fortunate, certainly – part of three state championship high school golf teams, made my college team my freshman year, won maybe a dozen club championships or other decent local amateur events, and several titles over the past 20 years of hickory events. But what amazes me is the camaraderie among the contestants in hickory golf. Golf is fun in so many ways, not sure why the human relationship element is so strong in hickory golf, but it sure is.”
Johnson’s play set is a mixture of pre- and post-1900 era clubs. Smooth face irons include a 26-degree William Murray long iron with a Charles Brand shaft (Brand bought out Murray in 1898); a Jack Morris 36-degree lofting iron (Hole-in One club); Willie Tucker lofter, 42 degrees; and a Tad Morris rut iron, 46 degrees.
“My only grooved club is a Stewart mashie (stamped James Kerr, Cairo; he was in Cairo, Egypt from 1914 through 1916),” he says. “There is also a punch-dot 40-degree Hillerich and Bradsby mashie that was in Mike Just’s playset. That was a gift from Just’s wife, Lynn, a dear friend of Karen’s.
“For grins, I recently added a Fairlie model Stewart post-registration mark anti-shank iron. I holed out with it a couple of times in the two weeks I’ve had it in the set. Just makes me laugh and gets all kinds of questions.”
Woods include a post-1900 driver, a three-wood from Louisville golf, and a Tad Moore bulldog. Pre-1900 woods include a replica long nose play club stamped “A Strath,” plus a Louisville Golf long nose fairway brassie custom-made for him by Mike Just.
Putters include two “The Spalding” tall blade putters, one plain or gun metal, one brass; plus a wooden head custom-made Samuel Ryder model that Mike Just also made to fit Johnson. “This may be the most popular putter within the pre-1900 playing group as I see many players with this model at gutty events,” he says.
“All these clubs are in and out of the set depending on the event, ball used, length of tees used,” he says. “I enjoy trying to use every club other than the putters every Sunday morning.”
Johnson is a regular at the National Hickory Championship and was its champion in 2014. He was honored with the tournament’s Lynah Sherrill Award in 2014 and in 2021 the NHC’s Dundee Award for his contributions to the tournament. Another favorite is the Wisconsin Gutty Challenge hosted by the Wisconsin Hickory Golfers in Eagle, Wisc., at the Eagle Springs Resort whose golf course dates to 1893. In 2019, Johnson was awarded the Mike Just Keeper of the Spirit Award by the Wisconsin Hickory Golfers.
He is most associated, though, with the Foxburg Hickory Championship, which he launched, with his wife, Karen, in 2009. Johnson was aware of, and had played, at the historic old venue in Foxburg, Pa., (1887) in 1995. There he discovered Foxburg’s incredible golf museum and was struck by the course’s timeless design and still extant pre-1900 features such as the square granite fixtures for water-and-sand located on each tee. A later discussion with Tad Moore about replica gutty balls then being produced inspired him to work with the Foxburg management to create the now classic Foxburg Hickory Championship.
Johnson is quick to credit Karen for her part in the event’s success. “I won’t say I could not manage without Karen, but the Foxburg Hickory Championship is what it is largely because of her organizational skills,” he says. “My lovely wife is such a strong supporter. The effort Karen puts into keeping entries organized, managing Thursday’s registration process, and the work she, Dawn, and the others do to keep us fed is just amazing! She started assisting me because of my passion for hickory golf and desire to expand the game, but she now views the time at Foxburg as an opportunity to spend three days with friends who have quickly become part of the family.”
One member of the Foxburg family, John Crow Miller, a co-founder of the SoHG, authored a 2020 monograph on Foxburg, titled: Foxburg Country Club: The Stonehenge of American Golf.
The largely pre-1900 gutty ball tournament annually draws 24 to 30 players, about 15 guests and a strong contingent of First Tee of Pittsburgh (FTP) players who join the tournament on Saturdays.
“I am proud of our relationship with the First Tee,” Johnson says. “They, of course, use hickory shafted equipment with period style balls and often play with our FHC contestants. Barry Markowitz and Gordon Beggs immediately come to mind, but there have been many others, including Dr. Bern Bernacki who first suggested involving them in some way. He is an advisory member of the First Tee board. I have always been very appreciative of their desire to make a difference.”
Johnson is keenly aware that change is nothing if not inevitable and loves every minute he has with the championship. “It is difficult to describe the emotional attachment I have with the Foxburg Hickory Championship. It is heartwarming to see old friends. Many of the relationships are now lifelong connections. We know we are not going to be able to manage it forever, and I am hopeful the club will want to maintain the continuity when the time comes, but not yet.”
As for this latest honor, Johnson says, “I am truly humbled, and deeply honored to receive the Society of Hickory Golfers’ Mike Brown Award. Being recognized by peers is the highest of honors, especially peers who appreciate the creation and continuance of modern hickory golf and of providing opportunities for others to enjoy this game. There are many others as worthy as me, maybe just hanging in there longer.
“I had conversations with Mike at several collector shows, always stopping by with his quiet demeanor and that trademark smile. I understand the respect the early organizers of the SoHG had for Mike.
“I am fortunate to have access to one of the greatest venues available in this country for our sport and to have a club whose membership is open for us taking it over for three days. I am blessed to have a terrific wife who encourages me to visit other events, and who tremendously assists in making Foxburg the success it is; and to have great friends who can’t wait to get together year after year and enjoy similar struggles and successes.
“On top of all this, to be honored for all of these things I enjoy, reminds me of how truly fortunate I am.”
Tom, from all your friends in the SoHG, at Foxburg and throughout the hickory world, it’s a safe bet to say that we are the fortunate ones whose lives are the better for your company and friendship.